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Church Still to Decide on Identity of Crown Prince Alexey and Princess Maria's Remains

18. October 2011 - 14:31

The issue of the identity of the remains of Crown Prince Alexey and Princess Maria's remains has not been discussed by the Russian Orthodox Church yet.

The remains were found near Yekaterinburg in 2007.

"No commission has been set up by the Church to identify the remains. The Synodal Canonization Commission has not discussed the issue either," Archpriest Georgy Mitrofanov has told Interfax-Religion.

The hierarchs have not asked the commission to look into the issue, he said.

On Thursday, representatives of the Imperial House of Romanov voiced their intention to ask the Russian authorities to set up a commission for the reburial of Alexey and Maria's remains.

Meanwhile, the head of the House of Romanov, Grand Duchess Maria Vladimirovna, said that any talk of reburial would be premature until the Church spelled out its position.

During the 1998 campaign for the reburial of the first set of "Yekaterinburg remains" - the remains of the imperial couple, three princesses and servants - the Church announced that it could not confirm their identity because there were questions to which answers had yet to be found.

"But some questions still have no answers. The Church has not changed its position as far as the 'first' remains are concerned: we stick to the Synod's decision passed in 1998. But this does not mean that it cannot be changed," the priest said.